Rama woke before the temple drums, the way he had woken every morning since the crossing, with one hand already closed around nothing. The room was gray and cool. Below the window a water carrier's pole creaked, and the smell of frying banana batter drifted up from the cookhouse.
He lay still and listened to his daughter breathe on the mat beside the bed. She had crept in sometime after midnight, as she did now whenever the house felt too large. One small fist was wound into the hem of Sekar's sleeve.
The mark on his forearm itched. He pushed back his sleeve and swore under his breath.
For three months the fractal had been a tight lace of pale lines, no wider than a man's palm. Now one branch had crept past the wrist bone and curled toward his elbow, thin as a hair. The tip of it was cold. It was not the cold of fear. It was the cold of a stone pulled from deep well water.
